


Inadmissible Result

by Whreflections



Series: Sterek Christmas Fics 2018 [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alive Hale Family, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Alternate Universe - No Hale Fire, Christmas Magic, Full Shift Werewolves, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-25
Updated: 2018-11-25
Packaged: 2019-08-29 03:32:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16736292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whreflections/pseuds/Whreflections
Summary: There's a cottage in the woods that supposedly grants a lifetime of love to couples who spend a night during the Christmas season inside its walls.  Since he's 100% certain Derek's feelings for him aren't romantic (and God, isn't that a tragedy), Stiles is sure that Derek is just the right person to help him test the enchantment.He's also sure that if the enchantment doesn't fail, he just might get everything he's ever wanted.





	Inadmissible Result

**Author's Note:**

> Short, and smol....I am nervously beginning a foray into writing Teen Wolf. 
> 
> If this does not go over terribly, there will probably be more Christmas fics between now and Christmas, because I love Christmas fics. 
> 
> Katie and Ali, this is all your fault, and I love you both so very much :*

Before the cottage, there were, in hindsight, signs that this was not all likely to go precisely as Stiles had planned. 

At the time, in Scott’s room checking over everything he’d packed for the short trip, he hadn’t had the benefit of hindsight, only determination, certainty of both success and failure based on his years of experience with Derek, and research.  Weeks and weeks of research. 

“C’mon, you have to admit; this plan is perfect,” Stiles had said, muffled, the lens cap to his camera in his mouth before he took it off to snap it back into place. 

Scott’s hesitance was all over him—in his eyes, and in his hands that still held the carrying case for Stiles camera, without holding it out. 

Stiles snatched it. 

“Would you stop staring at me like that?  It’s _perfect_ ; we spend the night in the house, we get some great video and data, and we disprove the myth—or somehow we prove it, but I mean that’s like, a .5% chance at best.  There’s no way this can go wrong.” Stiles certainty was as strong as Scott’s hesitance.  He had been careful with his planning; he’d done his homework.  Hell, he’d been out to the cottage for himself to a do a little poking around—and sure, he was still just a third year Enchantment major, but he knew enough that he’d have been able to feel anything dangerous emanating from the place.  All he’d felt was the faint ripple of something beneath the surface, like a rising mist. 

The Christmas Cottage had opened to the public four years ago, a property said to have been handed down through the Dresser family for over 200 years.  It had been updated, over time, but the cabin walls themselves had never been altered, and had never seemed to need it—just one sign, the family said, that proved the enchantment they’d held the secret of for generations was still intact. 

If the tale was to be believed, decades past a mage had enchanted the very beams, not with infatuation or desire, but with the power to ensure a lifetime of love to any who spent the night together within its walls during the Christmas season.  For most of its history, it had been a family secret, passed down and practiced by members of every generation, until Chloe Dresser’s husband, Paul, had passed away.  Without children to pass the house down to, she’d decided to instead offer it up to the world, renting it out only for the single season when its magic was said to be activated.  She had expected moderate response, but now?

Now, the cottage was booked for the most popular dates two years in advance, and though the cottage had only been taking guests a relatively short time, the current statistics showed that not a single relationship cemented at the cottage had failed. 

The thing was, the magic—if there was magic there at all—was too old and deep to properly measure.  Those who’d gone to the cottage to study it could register both with their own senses and their equipment a faint thread of magic in the air, like a low hum, and it did seem to rise in the presence of lovers.  That was, however, exactly the flaw in the data, from Stiles point of view. 

Only lovers booked the cottage, so if there _was_ magic there at all, there was no way to be certain how much it was capable of.  Could it make a man fall in love, or would it only deepen and solidify what was already present?  Would it work with strangers, or only soulmates?  What about those who should have been incompatible, could it change them, or would it fail?  Was the only magic present little more than ‘background radiation’, the normal levels of magic that would build up over time in any building that had been inhabited by a fair number of mages? 

No one knew, yet, because no one had gotten scientific enough with it, yet.  That made it the perfect end of semester project for his Enchantment Detection class—that, and the fact that being friends with Lydia Martin meant he had an in.  With her mother acting as current manager for the property, he’d managed to score an opportunity to try the Cottage for himself.  The span of time at the end of November was the only space with occasionally sparse bookings, as no one was sure precisely when the magic activated.  According the family records and legends, though, the season began the day before Thanksgiving.  With the Sunday night following Thanksgiving offered to him, he was sure his test would be valid. 

 _He_ was sure.  Scott, on the other hand, kept looking at him like there was something sharp stuck in his throat. 

Stiles sighed, his shoulders slumping to let the duffle bag he’d already packed slip to the floor with a thud.  “Dude, just spit it out.”

Before trying, Scott looked twice at the door, twice at the window, and back to Stiles.  If anything, he only looked more pained.  “You’ve been in love with Derek—“

“I’ve had a giant unproductive crush on Derek—“

“— _in love_ with Derek since we were 7.  This isn’t an impartial test, and if it doesn’t work—“

“Of course it’s not going to work; the entire fucking _point_ is that it’s not going to work, Scott!”  Stiles hefted the bag back onto his shoulder, fingers worrying at the edge of the strap where the youngest Hale had chewed it years ago on a full moon.  “Derek could not get any straighter; Derek is not going to fall in love with me, okay?  We’re going to hang out and film some partially scientific partially entertaining commentary, and I’m going to write a paper to go with it, and I’m going to get an A in Enchantment Detection.  The end.” 

Scott’s eyes softened, hitting the shade that Stiles knew from experience could have Allison forgiving him of just about anything in a matter of seconds.  It was a good look on him; he had the face for it. 

It wasn’t going to make Stiles stay. 

Scott squeezed his arm, careful, like he’d learned to be after the bite.  “I just don’t want you going into this thinking it’s your chance to be with Derek, and then it doesn’t happen, because whatever you say about not believing this legend, or believing there’s caveats…this isn’t a love potion.  If what happens there really happens….then it’s _real_.  He’ll really love you.  You can’t tell me you don’t want that.” 

Outside, Stiles could hear tires crunching leaves, and Melissa going to the door.  He didn’t have to be a werewolf to know it was the Camaro, with Derek in it. 

“I gotta go, okay?  I gotta go.”

His heart was beating a little faster than it should have, when he turned to leave.  Scott could hear that, too, so in a way, even though Stiles hadn’t said it out loud, he’d given Scott his answer after all. 

=====

In the car on the way to the cottage, Stiles had every chance to see that something was up.  It was, retrospectively, not so much a flashing sign as a claxon, and still, when he was in the moment, it had gone right over him, or right through him, or dispersed somewhere out the window into the night. 

Derek had the windows cracked, because he liked the smell of the snow and the pines, and Stiles was huddled down in the passenger seat against the door, seat warmer turned on.  The mountains were looming closer and closer in the growing dark, and Stiles had been texting his dad while he still had signal, just in case he lost it. 

 _Hey, I may lose signal; hanging out with Derek tonight.  You know how he gets._  

There had been a wolf emoji, certainly, and probably a waxing moon. 

The distant strains of the non-descript late 90’s rock Derek had had playing in the background faded even further, and Stiles looked up to see Derek’s thumb on the volume, nudging it down.  His eyes didn’t leave the road, though they were set tight at the corners, strained more than Stiles knew they’d need to be for a werewolf on a mountain road at dusk.

“There’s a hundred other things you could do for your project.  It doesn’t have to be this,” Derek said, a touch of exasperation, with the solidity of practice.  If Stiles had noticed just how practiced, then, it might have changed everything. 

Instead, he pushed back, because arguing with Derek was a muscle memory that went back so far in his mind he could have named no origin.  “It does have to be this, because no one’s done it, and I’m in a perfect position to do it!  Lydia’s not going to; it’s not her area and she’s busy.  I’m pretty sure Scott wants to take Allison here, and what if the magic only responds to you once?  We don’t know enough to risk him coming with me—“

“I’m not saying you should go with anyone else.”  The engine revved, as if the car was trying to match Derek’s rise in tone, propelling the Camaro so fast through the gathering dark that all the reaching limbs of the pines blurred together into a mess of black.  Beneath them, the snow was just beginning to catch the glow of the rising moon.  “I’m saying you shouldn’t go at all.  If this magic is real, it’s powerful, and it’s meant to be taken seriously—and if it’s not real, you could ruin something that’s been special for a lot of people.  An entire family’s history.” 

Stiles sat forward, his phone dropping into his lap as he shoved his sleeves up.  If he leaned forward far enough, he knew he’d catch Derek’s eye, even though he was driving, still, even though the car never swerved.  “That’s just it, though; what if the magic only worked by bloodline?  Or what if people are paying more money than they can really afford for….relationship ‘insurance’ that isn’t real?  They should know that, and that’s going to be my job, too, you know?  It’s not just making enchantments of my own, it’s finding magic, discovering what’s real and what isn’t for people who don’t have the tools or the training to tell the difference.   This is a good project; it’s a great opportunity.”  Stiles licked his lips, dry from the wind, and the cold, and his nerves.  Half conscious of it, he’d already started somewhere in the last few minutes to worry at the biggest hole in his jeans, near the right knee.  “Unless you don’t want to go?  I mean you don’t have to; I can find someone else, but you said you would, and there’s no one else I can think of who’d be as safe trying it as me and you but—“

“I’m not turning around.”  Derek was a little short with him, then, and really, Stiles should have heard something in that, too—or seen it in the pinched look on his face, the grip of his hands.  For all that he nagged Derek about a lack of judgment, sometimes Stiles wasn’t all that great at it himself. 

Derek turned the music up, again, and Stiles leaned back and looked out, glimpses of the rising moon coming to him at moments like the snap quick view of a slide. 

=====

At the cottage, there was, truly, no explanation for how long it took him to understand—none, at least, beyond the years he’d spent watching Derek with Paige and Kate and Braeden.  The absolute that Derek was straight and out of reach was so firm in his mind that not much could shake it.  For the first few hours, even Derek’s obvious nerves in the cottage hadn’t made a dent. 

He was, in fact, so sure that he paused a moment in recording his data to let himself take a long look at Derek’s back as he bent over the fire, shirtless, long stretches of muscle and the bold lines of his triskele bared.  The firelight was gold on his skin, and the ache in Stiles’ belly pulled him in three directions. 

He wanted, of course, to taste his skin, wanted just as desperately to fall asleep on it.  He wanted everything with Derek; he always had.

Overshadowing both was the pang of knowing he’d most likely never have either, because if the numbers he’d gathered so far were any indication, it was possible the magic here was nothing but background noise. 

Still, Stiles gave himself a moment to imagine, lost in the shift of muscle and skin before Derek finished with the fire and stood, dusting his hands off on his jeans. 

Before he could turn, Stiles had his eyes back on his results, his pen tapping staccato against his notebook.  “So, there was a spike in the magic when the power went out, but I think we can put that down to dampening effect electricity has on most types of magic.  So far, I don’t see anything that makes me think—what?”

Derek was staring at him, hard, his mouth slightly open like he needed air, like he was struggling or like there was something in the air he just couldn’t bear to smell any longer.  His eyes wide, a little wild, and Stiles could only think at first that it had to be something he’d sensed with his werewolf sense, because there was nothing to _see_.  No obvious signs of magic in the air, no hint that the power was struggling to flicker back on, just Stiles, in a faded baseball shirt from his dad’s softball team years ago, and red flannel pants getting a little too short in the ankle from too much washing, and a blanket he’d nabbed out of the closet. 

The glasses he’d enchanted to help him work better in dark corners of the library glowed faintly, casting a soft blue light down onto his work—and, now, out toward Derek, until Stiles turned them off with a tap of his fingers.  They were unusual, maybe, but Derek had seen them half a dozen times at least. 

“What is it?  Do you feel something; is something happening with the cottage—“

“I have to go outside,” Derek said, retreating even as he said it.  If he’d been sharper, or shorter, Stiles might have believed him—but he’d never been anything but indulgent when it came to helping Stiles like this, even when he grumbled, even when he pretended to hate it right up until the end.  Then, in that moment, _have to_ sounded too much like desperation, enough that the spur of wondering brought Stiles to his feet.   
  
“Hey, no, you can’t!  We can’t say we tested it all night if one of us goes out the door; for all we know that might break the seal or something.  You can run tomorrow.”  That had been part of his plan; Stiles was sure of it.  You couldn’t grow up around a pack of werewolves without knowing the set of their shoulders just before they were about the transform, the freedom that sometimes lit up their eyes in the second their paws first touched dirt.  “Come on, Derek; just come back and sit by the fire.  You can do it with a fur coat if you want, but I think you’d be more comfortable—“

“If I don’t leave, and this works—“  Derek turned to face him, his eyes flashing blue so quick Stiles wasn’t at all sure it hadn’t been a trick of the light.  “You’ll be stuck with me; do you understand that?  It’s not a love potion that we can get you an antidote for; this is old magic.  If it works, you’ll be bound to me; you’ll have no choice.  I can’t make you do that; not when I know that you don’t want—that you’ve never wanted—“

“To be a werewolf?”  Stiles didn’t wait for confirmation; he didn’t need it.  The twist of pain at the corner of Derek’s mouth was telling enough.  “ _If_ it works—and that’s a big if because it’s not going to—then I’ll be taking your mating bite, but that doesn’t mean I’ll ask your mother for the _bite_ bite, and I don’t have to!  It’s archaic and old fashioned and I like doing magic, and sure I could keep it up but it wouldn’t be the same—so yeah, I know just what I’d be saying yes to, here, and what I’d still say no to, and none of that matters at all because this isn’t going to work!  You’re the straightest guy I’ve ever met—and that’s including Scott, by the way, who has up to this point never even experimented in college, so I _know_ this isn’t going to work out, so if you’re really having some kind of gay panic right now because this place—“  Stiles flung his arms wide, directed at the beams overhead and all around, and for a moment, he could have sworn he felt _something_ push back.  “—is making you feel things you don’t want, then that’s a reason to quit, but be honest with me.  If the even slight chance that this might happen is something you can’t accept—“

In Derek’s telling of this story, late at night in the quiet of their room, he will remember that Stiles voice cracked, on the verge of tears that might have been at least half anger.  He will remember, and tell Stiles in that soft voice that only happens when they’re alone that he couldn’t take it; he couldn’t bear entertaining the concept that having Stiles for the rest of his life would be something he’d have fought to avoid. 

Stiles memories of that specific moment weren’t so clear.  He was talking, closer to yelling than he would have preferred, and then Derek was crossing the distance between them.  There was a weight in his chest that could have become a sob, maybe, but it was knocked right out of him when Derek reached him and picked him up and kept going, all the way until they hit the closet door.  It rattled, and Stiles had a moment of presence of mind clear enough to realize that Derek had wrapped his arms so tight around Stiles back that no part of Stiles absorbed any of the shock. 

A detail, but then, aren’t those the most important parts of life?  Details, like the strength in Derek’s arms, and the warm, rich, and utterly right taste of his mouth, and the blue in his eyes that lingered after they paused to breathe, shining in the half dark, full of awe. 

Those details, Stiles will remember for the rest of his life. 

=====

After the cottage, there came a lifetime. 

The morning after, standing on the back porch with Derek in the searing cold, nestling into the near unnatural werewolf warmth of him, and holding his phone out to take a picture that captured the bites on both their necks.  For the project, ostensibly, as evidence, but it was for himself, too, and they both knew it. 

Back home, telling his father, and watching his forehead furrow with worry that this wouldn’t hold, that something would happen to break it and Stiles would lose what he’d only thought he’d gained. 

At the Hale house, Peter leaning over the upstairs balcony with a cigarette dangling from his fingers, his congratulations as slow and deliberate as the information that followed.  _Of course, it wasn’t exactly an impartial test, was it?  I mean how could it be, since Derek was already in love with you._

The present, at the dinner table with his daughter, little pinprick claws waving on the tips of her fingers as she reached out for the spoon. 

With the next bite, Stiles reached out to ruffle her soft hair, static sticking it to his palm.  “—and that’s the story of how your daddy lied and ruined my end of semester project, and I had to edit my paper to state that the results would have to be thrown out.” 

Across the table, Derek rolled his eyes, his knife jabbing with just a little more force into his toast—though even that force, for him, was slight.  Measured; play acting.  “Excuse me if I don’t apologize.”

Stiles loaded the spoon with another bite of cinnamon applesauce, and feigned some inattention of his own.  “If he’d just told the truth, I never would have dated that _really awful_ —“

Derek’s growl interrupted, real and deep and rooted so firmly in affection that Stiles could do nothing but laugh. 

 

 


End file.
